Category Archives: Siri

Philips Hue lighting is now a part of the Apple’s growing HomeKit system, so you can use Siri to control the lights in the house. And with phrases like the one above, you can get incredibly specific with how you want the lighting to feel

The Philips Hue lights will work alongside other other HomeKit products, like garage door openers, front door locks, thermostats and blinds. For example, when you arrive in from work, the lights will (in theory) know when the front door unlocks and will automatically adjust to how you like them after a long day

Apple is looking to make Siri better, and its latest move is buying a voice-recognition startup. The company today confirmed to the Financial Times it bought VocalIQ, a company dedicated to allowing voice assistants to understand natural dialog. Think more sci-fi AI and less repeating the same thing three times to get it right. Apple didn’t say exactly how it plans to make use of vocal IQ, however. It just provided its standard issue response for company purchases: “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.” But it’s not…

We’ve just taken another significant step towards Spike Jonze’s world of human-like AI.
Apple has pushed out its iOS 7.1 beta 5 firmware, and with it comes some more natural-sounding Siri voices for the UK, Australia and Japan. Go check them out over on AppleInsider.
Still no word on when 7.1 will be available for public download but we’re hearing that we’re close to the final build.
More blips!
“Hey Siri, show me some more blips”
* Panasonic, Aliens called and it wants its Power Loader exosuit back * Xbox Kinect is keeping peace on the Korean border * Oculus Rift gets the star treatment with Sundance debut

Intel’s funny wireless earpiece, known as Jarvis, will process your voice commands on device instead of using the internet and causing you to wait long,
tedious seconds for your results.
The problem with most voice recognition services is that they have to outsource the actual work of figuring out what you’ve said to a more powerful machine elsewhere, using the internet to transmit it.
The time it takes to send your voice command off, process it and return the result is generally about the same amount of time it takes for you to get annoyed.
Cocker But Intel says it has, with the help of an anonymous third party, created a processor/software combo powerful enough to translate the human voice but small enough to fit onto its Jarvis headset.
That means that while Jarvis works better in tandem with an internet connection and a phone or a tablet, it can also function on its own.
Intel is also trying to sell its small-but-mighty voice recognition tech to other companies, so we could soon see it popping up in other phones and tablets.
* Will voice recognition be a big deal at MWC 2014? Here’s what to expect